quote:

Combat will be old-school. "It'll feel like Baldur's Gate 2. After discussions here, we decided to pursue a similar combat style to the [games on the Infinity Engine, like Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale]—real time with pause. It'll offer the same breadth and depth of combat choices as you'd expect from combats in Baldur's Gate, and our combat system has been one of the first systems we've delved into for the Kickstarter."

The world is totally original. "It's fantasy with its own voice. Josh Sawyer has been leading the charge with the world and race creation—at first glance, players will recognize archetypes and seemingly-familiar landscapes, but often, we just use that as a means to draw you in and let you begin to see the subtleties and differences. Our first goal with the world creation was to make a world that's fun to explore first, and then construct the lore, factions, and conflicts around that."

This is a game with soul. "So there are a few things—we want the player to be able to build their own character, and we want the player to be able to evolve and grow. And this growth wouldn't be limited to the first game, but would continue into subsequent titles as well. The story and world is built around the concept of magic and power tied to a character's soul, and the player's soul and the souls of his companions are... special."

You won't get to create your own party. That's not a bad thing. "Much like Baldur's Gate and Planescape Torment, the player creates one character and gathers a party while exploring the world. We'll be giving the companions as much love and attention as we've done in our titles in the past, from Torment all the way up to [Neverwinter Nights 2:] Mask of the Betrayer and Fallout: New Vegas. We don't want them to outshine the player, but support him and act as a sounding board for his decisions and choices in the game. Our desire is the player character and the companions (if they survive) will go beyond simply one title into future installments."

It will look like the old classic isometric games. "While Project: Eternity heralds back to the Infinity Engine games our fans have played, we'll be using a different engine and it will be isometric. We feel isometric lends itself to more tactical party-based play."

If the Kickstarter fails, they'll just try again. "[We'll] refine the idea, figure out what didn't work, then try again. The nice thing about KS is that you know in 30 days (often, less) if your idea doesn't resonate with the public, rather than 2-3 years down the line or trying to pump so many marketing dollars at people they become brainwashed into liking an idea that never resonated with them in the first place. (That's my final rant.)"

If the Kickstarter succeeds, this will be a franchise. "It means we FINALLY have a world of our own that we can build upon, not just for this title but for future releases down the line. We've wanted to do our own RPG world for a long, long time, and it's been hard to pursue outside of existing franchises. Project: Eternity is our chance to take all the RPG knowledge, mechanics, lore, and characterization we've learned over the years and turn it into the game our fans have been hungering for."

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Project Eternity is still early in development and we are still working on many of the cultures, factions, and ethnic groups of the world and debating many of the system concepts. However, there are certain fundamental things we want to let you know about the game and the setting for Project Eternity.

Your Party
The maximum party size is the player's main character (PC) and up to five companions for a total of six characters. This does not preclude the addition of temporary characters in special circumstances. Companions are never forced on the player. Players can explore the entire world and its story on their own if they so choose. We feel companions are excellent sounding boards for the player's (and other companions') actions, but the story is ultimately about the player's personal conflict among the larger social and political complexities of the world.

Formations
A key element of the classic party-based tactical combat that we are developing is the use of party formations. As in the good ol' games, you can arrange your party in a large number of set formations. You can also construct your own formations if you want to get fancy. When moving companions, you have the ability to rotate formations for more precise positioning.

Character Creation
At a minimum, players will be able to specify their main character's name, sex, class, race (including subrace), culture, traits, ability scores, portrait, and the fundamental starting options of his or her class (gear, skills, and talents). We have not worked out customization details of character avatars, but we believe those are important and will be updating on these specifics in the future.

Companions
In Project Eternity, companions exist for both narrative and mechanical purposes. Companions are designed to have a driving interest in the player's central conflict. Their personalities and motivations open plot branches and generate conflicts for players to resolve over the course of the story. They are highly reactive to the player's actions and to the world around them. Additionally, companions exist to give players strategic management options in party composition that expand the party's capabilities in exploration, combat, and quest resolution. It is no coincidence that there are at least as many companions as there are classes. As stated above, companions are not required to play through Project Eternity's story, but we feel that they can add greatly to the experience.

The Set-Up
The player witnesses an extraordinary and horrific supernatural event that thrusts them into a unique and difficult circumstance. Burdened with the consequences of this event, the player has to investigate what has happened in order to free themselves from the restless forces that follow and haunt them wherever they go.

The Nature of You
Your character is not required to be of any particular race, cultural background, sex, class, moral outlook, personality, organization, etc. The premise is that you are a victim of circumstance. How you choose to deal with your situation is up to you. You can bear it with stoicism and restraint or fly off in a rage at anyone who gets in your way. The world will react to your choices, but the game is designed to give you the freedom to play your character the way you want to.

Races
We are still developing the races of Project Eternity, but we are creating a range that encompasses the recognizable (e.g. humans, elves, dwarves), the out-of-the-ordinary (e.g. the so-called "godlike"), and the truly odd (?!). Races and subraces differ from each other culturally, but the races also have different physiological factors that can contribute to friction and confusion between them.

Within even the recognizable races (including humans), we are creating a variety of ethnic subtypes and nationalities. This world's races did not all spring forth from the same place, and millennia of independent development have resulted in distinctive and unconnected groups. For example, the dwarf ranger below is originally from a southern boreal region that is quite different from the temperate homes of her distant kin to the north.

Additionally, Project Eternity's world contains some isolated races and ethnicities, but transoceanic exploration and cultural cohabitation have heavily mixed many racial and ethnic groups over time. This mixing is not always... peaceful. At times it has degenerated into genocide and long-standing prejudices are ingrained in many cultures.

***

That's all for today's update. We'll have more information on the world and systems in the near future. Please give us your feedback and thank you for all of the ideas and support you've given so far!

quote: (post)

Originally posted by Tzeentch._
The game doesn't sound particularly interesting to me, but I appreciate what they're trying to do. If a major company could get full financing for a game from non-profit investors, it could break the chain of publisher enslavement we've been seeing the last half-decade or so.

quote: (post)

Originally posted by Nephthys
Publishers wanted to exploit Kickstarter.

'If a known developer is using Kickstarter to fund its next game, be careful -- the money might end up getting used to ostensibly give a major publisher a new game for free. Obsidian CEO Feargus Urquhart has revealed that publishers tried to use his company for that very purpose.

"We were actually contacted by some publishers over the last few months that wanted to use us to do a Kickstarter," he revealed on his team's own KS page. "I said to them 'So, you want us to do a Kickstarter for, using our name, we then get the Kickstarter money to make the game, you then publish the game, but we then don't get to keep the brand we make and we only get a portion of the profits.'

"They said, 'Yes'."


I'm putting 20 down on this being EA. Anyone want in on that?